«Writers Are Crazy and Not Role Models»

Immersed in cosmic optimism, after titles like 'Joy' or 'The Kisses,' Manuel Vilas (Barbastro, 1962) returns to the scene with 'The Best Book in the World' (Destino). It is a novel with the appearance of a diary in which he shows his B-side and the futile effort to write that definitive book. In an autobiographical key, humor and brutal sincerity are his weapons to talk about serious things like imposture, death, posterity, or a solemnity that the winner of the Nadal Prize with 'Us' abhors.

-He turns around like a sock to discover Manuel Vilas?

-I tell everything that is not told about the lives of writers. I show their B-side. The image of the writer is that of a notable, illustrious, exemplary being; a model citizen and moral guide. But the normal life of a writer is full of comic and ordinary worries over which I draw back the thick veil.

-It looks like a diary, but you insist it's a novel.

-The debate over literary genres doesn't matter to me. Umbral said that the novel in Spain is a superstition. The important thing is to captivate the reader. And this is a novel because of the great load of subjectivity in the text. It's not memoirs, nor an essay, nor a diary.

-What need did you have to become a character?

-To believe what I write. That's why my name and my life appear. It's like a notarial act: this is true, and I sign it.

-The tone is tragicomic. You laugh at yourself but also feel sorrow.

-Comedy dominates, which does not hide the pain and adversities of any life. But there are dark parts. A descent into the depths of the soul.

-Is every writer an impostor, as you suggest?

-The impostor syndrome attacks writers a lot. In meetings with readers, I always expect someone to raise their hand and say: «It's a lie; that man is not a writer. He's an impostor.» I doubt, I insist, on the idea of the social exemplarity of the writer. We are not role models for anything. And from there I jump to imposture and solemnity.

-You flee from solemnity as if it were the plague.

-The book is a manifesto against those solemnities that invade life, which is vulgar and ordinary, as novels show. When a writer is awarded, everything becomes solemn. It's a comic paradox. Hypocrisy reigns in solemnity. It makes me nervous, like Woody Allen and Luis Buñuel. I also have difficulties accepting authority, which is always superstitious.

-The worst part about being a writer?

-When a reader tells you they didn't like your novel. Readers always tell the truth. Success and failure are always in their hands. They have no filter and are always right. You feel like you've failed when you don't move them. Success is when they tell you your novel has changed their life.

-Before being a writer, you say you're addicted to words as you were to alcohol?

-Writing is an addiction. I need to put into words what I see and live. If I go more than two days without writing, I feel terrible. If I went three months without doing it, I'd get sick.

-You also say that writers are a bunch of crazies.

-To write, you have to be a little crazy. Their craziness sometimes gains public authority and becomes works of art. You can remain crazy or become a genius. Writers are great curious people, gossips who ask the most unexpected questions and don't take any truth for granted. They live on the edge and offer alternative plans for life.

-The book arises after crossing the infamous threshold of 60 years old? What went through your mind?

-Numbers have great power. When they hit me, I had the mathematical certainty of having more past than future. That led me to a crisis and to take stock of my life. You come face-to-face with your working life and see where you've spent your vital energy. And that's even though writers never retire. They can't. Their work is life itself. But time is inexorable.

-It's obvious that Manuel Vilas has reconciled with Manuel Vilas. Is your self-esteem through the roof?

-Indeed it is. But it scares me a lot. No one admits it, but everyone fears failure, which can be getting fired or getting sick. Failure is punished no matter how much it's disguised. Aging is failing. In life, you can't say aging sucks big time. In novels, yes; just like in movies that also allow saying what's not in public conversation.

-You celebrate life by talking about death.

-It's the great mystery. We don't know why we die. We laugh at it; we ignore it. We hide it from public conversation. But it's life's fundamental fact. I claim the mystery of death; medical descriptions don't suffice for us.

-Has this book allowed you to find out why you write?

-It's the fundamental question. My father felt puzzled by me; he didn't quite understand me being a poet. He was a traveling salesman and shopkeeper; my mother was a farmer. I've written almost 600 pages to understand why words chose me.

- -Se confiesa anarco-republicano pero no anticapitalista y ateo.

- In society there are two fundamental things: political modernity and economic prosperity without which there's no culture. I'm not naive. I'm not anti-capitalist. Outside capitalism there's nothing although it evidently needs correcting. I claim atheism and natural religion: worshiping your dead.

- -What do you expect from posterity?

- I like profitable posterity like Cervantes'. A writer's success means those who come after him can profit economically. There are thousands of Spanish teachers worldwide who live thanks to Cervantes who's an industry. He's prestigious as one of literature's greats. That makes Spanish a cultural language studied globally. If we had four Cervantes we'd be better off. Thanks to him many people can afford their lives. Without him we'd struggle greatly for Spanish to be recognized as a study language.

- -In your book's gallery of characters Jaime Gil De Biedma stands out as an example despite his dark side involving children.

- I read his poems at fifteen. I don't care if he's good or bad as an author; he was my life model prioritizing life over literature which's crucial teaching. Life always trumps literature.

- -Recalls Javier Marías' marble coldness

- Yes but highlights him among greats perhaps best of his generation most gifted last forty years genius dying young seventy compared friend Fernando Marías same fate equalizing power death two doing same thing dying early differing literary evaluations genius normal interested more life Javier writing both spent lives words choosing pages over family friends movies dying eventually